The DMK staged a walkout from the Tamil Nadu Assembly on Wednesday demanding the arrest of BJP leader SVe Shekar for posting derogatory comments on women journalists.

MK Stalin, the Working President of DMK, alleged that the state government is not ready to take action against SVe Shekar since he is related to the Chief Secretary Girija Vaidyanathan.

Speaking to reporters, Stalin said, “As Speaker didn’t allow us to raise the issue in the Assembly, we staged a walkout.”

However, a lawyer who did not wish to be named said that SVe Shekar cannot be arrested now. “The police cannot arrest SVe Shekar now since the case is in the court. It comes for hearing on June 20,” he said.

In April, BJP leader and former MLA SVe Shekar had shared an abusive post on Facebook stating that women journalists sleep around for work, which sparked massive outrage. His post, that was later taken down, came after Tamil Nadu Governor Banwarilal Purohit patted a woman journalist’s cheek without her consent during a press conference.

The post, titled ‘Madurai University, the Governor and a virgin girl’s cheek’, said, “”I feel pity while looking at that woman journalist. She claims she was disturbed because the governor touched her. But when you read her tweets, it is understood that her intention was to target the Governor and Modi. It is actually the governor who has to wash his hands with Phenoyl after touching her. These (TN media persons) are cheap and disgusting creatures. Most people who work in the media in TN are usually Illiterate, cheap and don’t have any general knowledge. This woman is not any different.”

The post also said, “”Recently this disgusting fact has come out through complaints that women cannot become reporters or anchors unless they sleep with top bosses. And with these faces, they come out to ask questions to the governor,” thus accusing all the women journalists of Tamil Nadu.

A complaint was lodged on Sve Shekher following the Facebook post by the Cyber Crime police. SVe Shekher had then approached the court with a petition seeking anticipatory bail. The Madras HC had rejected his anticipatory bail plea saying that forwarding a message is equal to endorsing it.

“What is said is important, but who has said it, is very important in a society because people respect others for their social status. When a celebrity-like person forwards messages like this, the common public will start believing that these types of things are going on. This sends a wrong message to society at a time when we are talking about women empowerment,” the HC had remarked.